“I hope I can get them to think a bit differently, and then to help make things happen a bit differently.”

These are the words of Dayo Koleosho, an actor with the groundbreaking theatre company Access All Areas, describing what he hopes the public will gain from his new show, Madhouse re:exit.

I’ve just written about the project for the Guardian. It’s a show that has been developed and performed by autistic and learning disabled artists and it highlights themes of institutionalisation and isolation, and explores the past, present and future of social care.

The show, which I caught during its London run, opens at the Lowry in Salford on 17 May as part of the Week 53 festival and follows more than two years of research and development.

“As services are cut, people are becoming stuck at home and the isolating walls of institutions are being replaced by people’s bedroom walls,” says Nick Llewellyn, artistic director of Access All Areas. “The walls are still there but [they are] more hidden or societal rather than physical.”

All the images here are shot by photographer Helen Murray, and you can read the entire piece about this superb show over on the Guardian website.

Dayo Koleosho as The Eater, in Madhouse re:exit by Access All Areas (all photos by Helen Murray)Dayo Koleosho as The EaterImogen Roberts as The Goddess]

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Our Senior SEN Lawyer, Lucy Hayes, spoke to BBC Radio 5 Live yesterday about the thousands of children with special educational needs being ‘off-rolled’ from schools. Listen to the full programme, “The Children 'Vanishing' From Schools” here: https://t.co/hCzxgMRwf2 #SEND

This, on the barriers some of us face to participating in society & community, and solutions like 'deep democracy, not tinkering at the edges with yet another consultation or putting more and more information online if it excludes some and doesn’t lead to real power'. Absolutely.